I have a 2003 Chevy truck. It was wrecked and I fixed all the damage, I just need to get it painted. The whole truck needs painted minus the inside the bed and door jams, those areas are ok. Does anyone have experience with Maaco paint jobs? Are they okay or should I avoid them like the plague?
It’s been a while, but they did a good job for me. You an save money by prepping the truck yourself. That means you will remove all the stuff you don’t want painted or mask it. You should mask the windows, too. Talk to them about you pepping the truck and see how much you can save. It might be worth it to you. And paint it the same color.
Decent job for the money. People won’t gather in the parking lot with a bunch of oohs and aahs about the paint on your truck but who wants that any way.
As someone who once worked in body shop. I can tell you that much of our business consisted of people who were not satisfied with Macco’s work. The cry of “Here comes the Ambassador.” was a reoccurring joke.
I had a similar situation to yours. I elected to do the paint myself. I went to Harbor Freight and bought a paint sprayer and all the fittings and a oil/water separator and pressure regulator all for about $40. I used PPG Omni paint and it turned out wonderful. If you are a do it yourself I would recommend doing it yourself.
At around the sometime I had a coworker who got a Maaco job done, and while mine took a little longer it cost about the same and looked Much better (I did have to wet sand the clear coat, it was a little orange peel.) Just remember Prep Prep Prep.
You can find pretty good instructions online if you look around. I say go for it.
P.S. You may want to buy some cheep Oops paint and practice on a toolbox or something.
I’m not impressed with them at all. My son’s old school car was shot by them after I did the body work and it looked great; for about 2 years. After that it was oxidized badly.
The real kicker was when my oldest son dropped off his Camaro airdam (damaged by a raccoon). MAACO offered to even ship it back to him so kudos to them.
A week later UPS dropped off a box about 2.5 feet long and 1.5 feet wide by a foot deep.
Since the airdam is about 6 feet long this created some puzzlement on his part.
Upon opening the box he discovered they had folded the ABS plastic airdam three times over and crammed it in that undersized box.
The box was full of paint chips that had cracked off, the airdam was missing a good part of its paint, and there were even paint smears on the inside of the box showing that the paint had not even set up yet before being shoved in there.
Real nice. A foot long weenie stuffed into a Vienna sausage size can.
The manager stated they “had done nothing wrong” and would agree to nothing more than a repaint and would not replace the now distorted airdam that had been folded inside a box for 4 or 5 days. Morons is the operative word in my opinion.
DIY is not a bad option at all. Practice on an old fender or hood, use a HVLP gun, make sure the moisture is kept out of the compressor and lines, and your work will likely be better than a MAACO job.
I do recommend them, but I suggest two things.
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Do as much prep work as you can. The better the condition is when it gets there, the better and cheaper your results.
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Pick a nice rainy day. They are not as busy on the rainy day and the rain removes the dust from the air so you get a better result.
I took my 93 Caprice to Maaco. I did as much prep work as possible, i.e. removed the badging and trim and stripped the old wax off. I asked around first and the local Maaco had a fairly good rep.
The paint job was decent. Five years down the road and it’s starting to show its age with some blemishes on the hood. The paint does require more care than a factory job. Overall, I got what I paid for.
Ed B.
The only thing I heard is that there can be grinding marks, overspray, and of course the quality of paint used.
Caution though if you are going to do it yourself now. The new paints can be very hazardous and you absolutely need to use a respirator. A self contained breathing apparatus is best and a spray booth but at least a respirator. People in shops are dying from being exposed. I quit my DIY painting for that reason unless using older technology.